In his latest Wired column, Bruce Schneier runs the thought-experiment of creating perfect identities. I noodled with this when my daughter was born — I got her birth certificate from the Hackney Council, a sheet of ordinary laser-printed A4, took it to the Canadian embassy with a couple of photos that could have been any baby, and a few weeks later, a Canadian passport arrived. I thought, hmm, what if I were do to this again next year, but this time with my own laser-printed "certificate?" I could make a new identity for Poesy to step into in 20 years when she tires of her existing database shadow.
Imagine you're in charge of infiltrating sleeper agents into the United States. The year is 1983, and the proliferation of identity databases is making it increasingly difficult to create fake credentials. Ten years ago, someone could have just shown up in the country and gotten a driver's license, Social Security card and bank account — possibly using the identity of someone roughly the same age who died as a young child — but it's getting harder. And you know that trend will only continue. So you decide to grow your own identities.
Call it "identity farming." You invent a handful of infants. You apply for Social Security numbers for them. Eventually, you open bank accounts for them, file tax returns for them, register them to vote, and apply for credit cards in their name. And now, 25 years later, you have a handful of identities ready and waiting for some real people to step into them.
How to Create the Perfect Fake Identity
